Today’s Lady News: Black Women More Likely To Die From Breast Cancer

Black woman are more likely to die from breast cancer, despite being less likely to get cancer in the first place, according to a new study of women in 13 U.S. cities by the Avon Foundation For Women. Lack of access to affordable health care is one of the key problems to overcome. [Reuters]

Idaho’s governor is paying his male employees more money than his female ones — including one male director who was hired five years after a female director and supervises less people, but earns $40,000 more. And some say the wage gap doesn’t exist… [Think Progress]

Saudi Arabia may allow women to compete in the 2012 summer Olympics in London if their athleticism still “meet[s] the standards of women’s decency,” despite the fact that women are basically forbidden from sports there. [New York Times]

On the Hollywood feminism of “Bridesmaids” and “Friends With Kids” star Chris O’Dowd. Be still, my heart. [Think Progress]

Dorothy Townsend, the first-ever female reporter in the L.A. Times city news room, died at 88. She started out on the “women’s page” but insisted on covering harder news. Townsend was eventually part of a team that won a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the Watts riots. [L.A. Times]

INTERNATIONAL

After a 16-year-old girl in Morocco committed suicide because she was ordered by a court to marry her rapist, activists are trying to change the part of the Moroccan penal code that condones “marital rape.” Rape is not recognized as a crime if the victim is your wife. [Al-Jazeera]

More on how so-called “honor crimes” are domestic abuse. [Guardian UK]

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